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CNET First Look

LG's player is cheap, feature-laden

The LG BP530 has built-in Wi-Fi and a good selection of apps, but there are just enough quirks to keep it from being a top Blu-ray player pick.

1:48 / December 10, 2013

Transcript

Hi.
This is Ty Pendlebury with the review of the LG BP530.
Now, are people still buying Blu-ray players in 2013?
If that's you, then you're probably looking to buy something that's more than a Blu-ray player with streaming one of your must-have features.
While it has the ole important Netflix playback, the LG BP530 offers a number of other features with the most intriguing being Private Listening.
This enables you to couple a player
with your phone and lets you use your headphones without snaking a cable across the living room.
It sounds like a good idea, but as the sound quality doesn't scale down for slow connections, you need to have a really good wireless connection or else you'll just hear mush.
The LG is fairly standard looking for a Blu-ray player with a dark gray and black appearance.
One gripe is that the playback buttons on the front are the same color as the rest of the player, and it's hard to tell them apart.
The remote control is pretty well-organized, but if you're typing a lot, they are a bit too squishy
for comfort.
Meanwhile, the Menu system is a bit strange with the My Apps icon almost completely useless.
The only vaguely interesting extra is Rhapsody, which appears as a link below My Apps so you don't really need to enter it at all.
What can I say about Netflix though?
It works pretty well, but unfortunately, it's a little slow to the load up and about 35 second.
It takes twice as long as the equivalent Samsung player.
Blu-ray quality is very good though with decent up scaling of DVDs and only some minor [unk] when playing back Blu-rays.
The LG BP530 is now available online for about $90 and it's pretty decent for that price, but I'd still go for the superior Samsung 5900, which is also available for about 90 bucks.
This has been Ty Pendlebury for cnet.com.

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